Ryan McMaken | The Libertarian Institute

The WTO Is Both Irrelevant and Unnecessary

by Ryan McMaken | Feb 26, 2020 | Economics, Featured Articles, Foreign Policy

The World Trade Organization (WTO) is in a state of crisis. Despite grandiose dreams of a global trade organization that would enforce global bureaucrats' broad vision for multilateral trade agreements, the world looks more and more like it neither wants nor needs an organization like the WTO. CNBC reports this week that the WTO is in "a reform-or-die moment," as both the US and Chinese governments appear uninterested in taking orders from the WTO. It once seemed like the World Trade Organization (WTO) was a very big deal. When it was formed in the 1990s, scores of states—rich and poor,...

Small Countries Are Better: They’re Often Richer and Safer Than Big Countries

by Ryan McMaken | Feb 13, 2020 | Featured Articles, Libertarianism

In the wake of the Brexit vote, Scottish nationalists have renewed their calls for a new referendum on Scottish independence. But many remain unconvinced, and many claim Scotland is "too small" to be an independent country. Others claim that Scotland is too poor, since Scotland's GDP per capita is only 90 percent that of England. But by no measure is Scotland a "poor" country. It may be poorer than England, but Scotland's GDP per capita puts it about halfway down the rankings of all Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. That means it's similar to France and...

This President Was Impeached for Being Insufficiently Pro-War

by Ryan McMaken | Jan 1, 2020 | Featured Articles, Foreign Policy, Politics

Buried in the House Judiciary Committee's impeachment report, is some insight into how the foreign policy establishment is attempting to re-create a new Cold War with the Russian Federation. Much of the report is devoted to one of the primary charges against the president: that he allegedly obstructed Congress's investigation. The first claim is largely asserted through legalese about how Trump was insufficiently cooperative with Congressional investigators. I'll let the lawyers cover that one. The second charge, however, is more policy-based and is meatier in that the Congressional majority...

How to Avoid Civil War: Decentralization, Nullification, Secession

by Ryan McMaken | Dec 5, 2019 | Featured Articles, Libertarianism

It's becoming more and more apparent that the United States will not be going back to "business as usual" after Donald Trump leaves office, and it is easy to imagine that the anti-Trump parties will use their return to power as an opportunity to settle scores against the hated rubes and "deplorables" who dared attempt to oppose their betters in Washington, DC, California, and New York. This ongoing conflict may manifest itself in the culture war through further attacks on people who take religious faith seriously, and on those who hold any social views unpopular among degreed people from...

OK Boomer, It’s Not Important to Respect (All) Your Elders

by Ryan McMaken | Nov 25, 2019 | Featured Articles, Libertarianism

Now that I've reached the ripe old of age of 42, I've been married for twenty years, and I've partially raised four children. The older I get, the more I realize how very wrong I was to ever think that a disproportionate number of people older than me possessed some sort of special knowledge about how to properly run one's life. The amount of laziness, moral degeneracy, arrogance, and general buffoonery I've witnessed among the older set has forever cured me of the idea that my "elders," prima facie, are a source of wisdom. This doesn't mean none of our elders provide excellent examples...

The Deep State: The Headless Fourth Branch of Government

by Ryan McMaken | Nov 22, 2019 | Featured Articles

School children learn that there are three branches of government: the legislative, executive, and judicial. In actual practice, however, there are four branches of government. The fourth is what for decades now has been called a "headless fourth branch of government," the administrative state. As early as 1937, in a "Report of the President's Committee on Administrative Management," the authors write: Without plan or intent, there has grown up a headless "fourth branch" of the Government, responsible to no one, and impossible of coordination with the general policies and work of the...

The Fed Looks Increasingly Concerned About Liquidity and Growth — Even If it Says Otherwise

by Ryan McMaken | Nov 3, 2019 | Economics, Featured Articles

The Federal Reserve lowered its benchmark interest rate on Wednesday, cutting the target federal funds rate by 0.25 percent to a range of 0.5 to 0.75 percent. The Fed's rate-setting committee, the FOMC, has now cut rates three times this year. The committee's rhetoric around the rate cut was the usual routine. The committee's statement indicated that " labor market remains strong and that economic activity has been rising at a moderate rate." But the official statement says something similar nearly every time the committee meets. So, there is no information here to suggests why the committee...

Not All Indian Reservations Are Alike

by Ryan McMaken | Oct 20, 2019 | Featured Articles

Back when I taught political science, a phrase I used when preparing students for the tests was "he who makes distinctions well, teaches well." That is, if we're talking about regime types, dear student, you better know the difference between a totalitarian regime, and a regime that is merely authoritarian. If we're talking about eighteenth-century American ideologies, you better know the difference between Alexander Hamilton and Thomas Jefferson. If we're talking economic policy, know the difference between fiscal policy and monetary policy. And when it comes to different groups of...

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